Language
Standard:
discovering the power to influence tone, mood, style, voice, and meaning
L.9-10.3; L.9-10.1; L.9-10.2
R.9-10.4; R.9-10.6; R.9-10.9
To be college and career ready in language, students must have firm control over the conventions of standard English. At the same time, they must
come to appreciate that language is as at least as much a matter of craft as of rules and be able to choose words, syntax, and punctuation to express
themselves and achieve particular functions and rhetorical effects. (CCSS, 51)
Featured Skill:
Students will understand the use of a dash, as well as other
forms of punctuation, to impact meaning within a text. Students
will understand how the revision process allows a writer to refine
a work and attend to craft and structure to impact meaning.
Featured Text
Grade Level:
9-10
(Suggested for grade 10)
The same primary text can be
located in a C-Mapp lesson for
social studies.
Theme and/or Essential Question

Primary Text:

 Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms

Secondary Text:
 Four Freedoms Paintings by Norman
Rockwell

 A Time of Agony for Japanese Americans by
Otto Frederick
 The Case—Please Hear Me Out—Against the
Em Dash

“A Dream Deferred”
Instruction
Process
What is freedom?
What is the price of our freedom?
As a nation, are we driven more by the
protection of our own freedom or by the
freedom of others?
What realities may have the greatest
influence over a nation’s decision to fight
for another?
 Should the rights of the minority be
sacrificed to maintain the rights of the
majority?
Activity
Instructional Steps
Modeling
and
explaining
the featured
grammar
skill
1. Background: Students should, in grades 6-8, learn about the function
of a dash. Students may not have explored in depth the use of a dash
in terms of purposeful inclusion in order to impact meaning.
Students may not have an understanding of the choices they have in
punctuation and how those choices ultimately create emphasis on a
particular element.
2. In this particular lesson, the teacher will not model the featured skill.
Students will engage in a close reading of the early draft and the final
draft of the Four Freedoms speech Roosevelt prepared and delivered
in order to determine the usage and impact of the grammatical
conventions. This lesson guides students to discover the impact of
usage in a piece of writing. For students to become well acquainted
with the text, multiple opportunities to read the selection will be
necessary.
Language  Page 1
Process
Activity
Instructional Steps
Reading 1: Student reading
3. We encourage the reading of the entire speech before the close study
in order to provide a context for the particular excerpt in this lesson.
Independently, students will read and annotate the speech.
Practice
in Context
Reading 2: Teacher or fluent reader reading
Reading text
and
identifying
deliberate
use of the
featured
grammar
skill
4. Teachers may want to read the excerpted section aloud while being
careful not to deliver the speech. Students need to hear all the words
pronounced correctly; delivery includes deliberate choices that could
begin to rob students of the opportunity to make meaning based on
the word choice, word order, and punctuation. Students will want to
translate the text. As students gain understanding, they will want to
make adjustments to the translation.
Reading 3: Answering questions to engage in the text
5. Students will read the early draft (draft #5) and the final draft of the
Four Freedoms speech (draft #7).
6. Students will continue to annotate the speech and answer questions.
(See handout) The questions are intended to promote
understanding/comprehension; however, these are not questions that
are all necessarily ‘right there’ types of questions. The questions all
require students to return to the text and potentially locate
additional information to increase understanding.
Analyzing and Evaluating : Rereading to discover
7. Students will use the second set of questions to direct their attention
to specific elements of the text. Students will also use Rockwell’s
paintings and a definition of positive and negative liberty to expand
their understanding.
Writing: Use the features skill(s)
Application
in Writing
8. Use the skills in a meaningful way. Evaluate the use of the skill in
other works.
Writing text
and applying
the featured 9. Students will, based on the multiple encounters with the focus skill,
grammar
determine the usage.
skill in a
10. Students will choose one of the writing options available.
deliberate
way
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Process
Activity
Instructional Steps
For extension: (Students could be provided options for
extension activities)



Extensions and Interventions


Additional
Resources
Teachers introduce Reagan’s Evil Empire speech. Students engage in
a rhetorical scavenger hunt within each document and compare the
elements within each.
Teachers work with social studies teachers to discuss the negative
and positive liberty theory asserted by Isaiah Berlin. A video can be
viewed on YouTube. Students will use textual evidence from the
speech to determine the kind of liberty Roosevelt might promote.
Students could read “A Time of Agony for Japanese Americans” to
help answer the larger essential questions. (This work does include
the use of a dash)
Students can read Emily Dickinson poetry and compare her use of a
dash to the usage they have already discovered. The teacher may
also want to include the Denman article referenced in the resources
section.
Multiple perspectives: “A Dream Deferred” was written nearly ten
years after The Four Freedoms speech was delivered. Students could
be asked to consider the ideas represented in the poem as
justification for or against the actualization of the freedoms Roosevelt
wishes for the citizens of the United States. On the surface the poem
may suggest a group feeling that the freedoms are not an
actualization; however, the poem being written may suggest a sense
of freedom. The question will ultimately have no one right answer;
this correctness of the answer will be based on the support a student
offers.
For Intervention and support:


Teachers should review the questions for the excerpt carefully. The
questions are intended to help the students attend to the reading for
comprehension. The use of the questions should be determined by
the students in the room. If students are able to read and
comprehend without questions that direct them line by line, then
these supports can be taken away. Always remember that the
purpose of the questions is to promote close reading of the selection;
the removal of the direct questions should not remove the opportunity
to read carefully and closely. The questions should only be reduced or
removed once students are equipped with the annotating and close
reading skills necessary to question the text naturally. (See the
attached handout).
To support students, students should be encouraged to work
collaboratively. The first reading should be done by students
independently—we want students to have the opportunity to try to
find some elements first. Reading aloud is an opportunity for a
second reading and to hear all the words pronounced correctly. As
students become more intimate with the selection, working
collaboratively allows them to build on the ideas of others and
Language  Page 3
negotiate the meaning of particular elements.
Process
Activity

Potential
Confusion



Teacher
Notes
Additional
Resources
to Consider



Instructional Steps
Ah, the use of a dash is a choice—the question is when should we make that
choice? Students, particularly those who are rule driven, will recognize that
other punctuation may serve the same purpose. We need to help students
understand that functionally the punctuation can be replaced by another for
correctness; however, function alone does not always articulate intent and
meaning.
Students may confuse a dash with a hyphen.
Answer keys are not provided. The lessons are intended to create
opportunities for students to rely on the text to gain independence in reading
complex texts. In this instructional model, the only wrong answers are those
that are not well supported or engage in fallacious reasoning.
It is best for teachers to engage in conversations and make instructional
decisions with a PLT about this lesson, its content, and student outcomes.
You may have noticed that providing background information is not part of
the beginning of the lesson. Within the Language Lessons, students will
need to rely upon the words and punctuation to create meaning without the
assistance of the teacher or other background building activities prior to the
learning experience. As students progress through the activities, they will
need information and build the background that we typically provide up
front. When students enter the world of college and career, they will need to
be equipped with the necessary skills to determine context, question a text,
determine the information they will need to know to increase understanding,
and know where to locate that information.
“About Dickinson’s Use of the Dash” by Kamilla Denman
“Colons, Dashes and Trouble” by Phillip Corbett (one section may not be
suitable for the classroom)
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Text: Four Freedoms
Step One: Read the excerpt to yourself and annotate the text.
Read the excerpt to yourself. Make note of words, phrases, and punctuation that intrigue you in some
way.
Look for irregularities, similarities, and unknowns.
Irregularity: I find it peculiar the way the author used this word.
Similarity: I am seeing a pattern here: in words, phrasing, or ideas. (Diction and Syntax)
Unknowns: I don’t know what that means. Or I don’t know what that means in this context.
Step Two: In this step your teacher or a classmate will read aloud.
Listen carefully to the words being read. If you read a word incorrectly, you may want to make note of
that change. Translate each line of the excerpt. As you learn more, you will want to adjust your
translation.
Step Three: In this step, you will be asked to read carefully the final version excerpt.
These questions are designed to promote understanding of the excerpt.
1. What does the word secure mean in the first
8. What does it mean to be free “ from fear”
two lines?
9. What does the word antithesis mean?
2. Why is Roosevelt using the term “human
10. What is a new order of tyranny?
freedoms” in the second line?
11. Who might be the new order of tyranny?
3. What is the first freedom?
12. What represents the opposite of the
4. What is the second freedom?
“new order?”
5. What is the third freedom?
13. As you review the entire excerpt, what
6. What does “from want” mean?
words or phrases are repeated?
7. What is the fourth freedom?
Step Four: The final version of this speech was the 7th draft.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
In this step, you will be
reviewing an excerpt from the 5th draft and the 7th, final draft.
In a group of three, carefully analyze the speech one paragraph at a time. Note changes made in
word choice, phrasing, or punctuation. In the first review, simply look for the changes from one
draft to the next. After you have noted the changes, determine the impact that change had on the
meaning or intent in the reading.
Review the way the four freedoms within the speech are presented. Structurally, how do the
constructions follow a parallel structure and how do they deviate from a parallel structure? What
impact do those choices in structure have on meaning?
Why do you think Roosevelt would not name the “new order?”
What are the differences between the “new order” and the “moral order?”
Can we have our fourth freedom and abide by the definition of a good society? How can these
both exist? How does the inclusion of the contradiction impact meaning?
Consider the definition of negative and positive liberty. Read each of the four freedoms carefully
and determine for each of the four freedoms, what kind of liberty is applied? Use textual evidence
to support your answer.
Analyze the Four Freedom paintings. Determine the textual evidence the artist may have used to
create these artistic representations. Cite specific textual evidence that you think impacted the
way the artist chose to represent the four freedoms?
How is the idea of positive and negative liberty represented in each work? Use the painting as a
text and cite textual evidence from the paintings.
Who do you think is the primary audience? What textual evidence would support this assertion?
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10. What is Roosevelt trying to convince his audience to support? How does he craft his speech to
promote his cause? Use textual evidence to support your answer.
11. How is he to convince his audience? Draw from textual evidence to support your answer.
12. How does the use of precise language, phrasing, and punctuation promote tone and meaning? Use
specific textual evidence to support your answer.
Step Five: Writing
Option 1: Read “The Case—Hear Me Out—Against the Em Dash” and write your own satirical piece that
includes an overuse of the dash.
Option 2: In a well written paragraph that includes a strategically placed dash, answer one of the
essential questions. In your answer of the essential question, you need to cite evidence from multiple
sources to substantiate your claim.
Option 3: Write a speech supporting a position on the Japanese Internment camps. As you write your
speech, you will want to consider the context of the time without considering the knowledge we now
have. Use a strategically placed dash within your speech. Be able to articulate why you chose to place the
dash in a particular place.
Berlin defines negative and positive liberty in an
essay published in 1958:
Negative liberty is the absence of obstacles,
barriers or constraints… Positive liberty is the
possibility of acting—or the fact of acting—in
such a way as to take control of one's life and
realize one's fundamental purposes
Extension
Choose one of the options provided by the
teacher.
Language  Page 6
Four Freedoms Speech (part 2 activity sheet)
Type of change made
The change: Describe
the change made from
draft 5 to draft 7
The impact: Describe
how the change impacts
tone, mood, voice, style
and/or meaning
Words:
Look for one word being
exchanged for another word.
Remember writers need to
attend to precise word choices,
which mean as readers we
must pay close attention to
connotation and shades of
meaning. The nuances of
these words impact the
reader/listeners reaction and
experience.
Phrasing:
Instead of simply one word
being changed, look for a
phrase that is added, deleted,
or reworded. The change in
phrasing may be a key to
unlocking intent and meaning.
Punctuation:
Look for punctuation that has
been added, deleted, or
changed. The use of particular
punctuation may have an
impact on the way the reader
receives the information and
ideas.
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